Tinseltown Riff by Shelly Frome Page A

hibiscus hedge and sat on the carpet of grass, he rationalized that besides unwinding, he was also killing time in a productive way. Re-appreciating narrative film technique till Leo and Iris went to the mat for the last time. Honing his storytelling skills for his stint at the Avalon Studios and the big day tomorrow. Besides, there really was nothing left for him to do except sit back, watch the film, wend his way to Iris’ and go to bed. Give his body and overworked brain a reprieve.  
    And so, at a still tipsy remove, he took in the restless opening credits of Hitchcock’s North by Northwest punctuated by Bernard Herrmann’s agitated score. However, unlike all the others—bobbing their heads in front of him, tittering and chuckling like the cynics they were—Ben began to get drawn in.    
    Which made no sense. Besides being half-sloshed and out of it, he knew the film inside and out. It was just a romantic spy chase from the fifties: Cary Grant in too-too-sunny Technicolor. There was no realism, no way whatsoever of taking it to heart. And certainly not while surrounded by people knowingly nudging their companions.   
    Trying another tack, pretending he was back in class at Southern Cal, he affected a nod in sync with the trio of cronies seated on a blanket to his immediate right. He recalled that Hitchcock wanted to do a chase across the faces of Mount Rushmore. Lehman, the screenwriter, wanted to do a frothy “movie/movie” featuring a cardboard Madison Avenue type. Hitchcock insisted on the chase. Giving way, Lehman added a double-agent love interest and a bogus manhunt forcing Cary Grant to hop a train to Chicago. Thereby concocting a getaway north by northwest to the top of a fake Mount Rushmore. There Grant hung by his fingers with one hand as a ghoulish baddie crunched his knuckles with the heel of a boot and, simultaneously, the double-duty heroine dangled over the precipice clutching Cary’s other hand.
    Still nodding away like a seasoned pro, Ben took in the sequence as an equally tipsy Grant skidded out of control down the Coast Highway. His car almost but not quite skittering off the cliff edge and plunging into the churning Pacific on a road that was supposed to be Glen Cove, Long Island.
    What a hoot.
    But, try as he may, his old nemesis began creeping in. The scene kept reminding him of careening down Angelique’s driveway and smacking into the girl’s truck .   And a subsequent scene, as Grant attempted to escape by sneaking aboard a train, reminded him of the time he himself attempted to leave LaLaLand for a job interview for a kiddie show out of the selfsame Chicago. As if the stifling heat of L.A.’s Union Station wasn’t bad enough, along with the hyper kids climbing the walls, the footrace to the coach cars had literally done him in. The hissing steam from the idling engines choked him. The screams of parents who’d lost track of their kids, the barricade of baggage handlers’ carts piled high plus the throng jostling for position only added to the melee. Out of nowhere, a heavyset guy with a shaved head rammed him against a sleeper car, stripped him of his train tickets and shoved him into the mob.   
    And what was Aunt June’s response?
    â€œWhat is that, a joke? You looking for sympathy? Try closing a two-story multi-million dollar teak-and-concrete job on Carbon Beach. Try putting something on the line for once, instead of sneaking out of town or always doing a number on me.”
    Turning away from the flickers on the mausoleum wall, even in his grogginess he knew she was right. He was doing a number, a Cary Grant—talking himself into it while secretly looking for a way out. Anything to let himself off the hook.
    And that hook wasn’t planted by Aunt June. That hook was planted the moment his mother left him with the Dr. Seuss book. The ribbon of candy-cane roads on the cover led up to a dancing boy on